January 5, 2013
Anglers –

As the annual Holiday Season now winds down, there are many groups of families in Los Cabos enjoying their final days in the warm sunshine of Southern Baja before returning home to their normal daily routines. As the winter season has now officially started, local weather has been unbeatable, sunny days with high temperatures averaging 75 degrees. As is the normal pattern for this time of year, there have been persistent northerly winds developing; this contributes to a rapid cooling trend of ocean waters. Currents sweeping in from the north are now averaging in the 72/73 degree range from Los Frailes to Chileno, while offshore of San Jose del Cabo and south towards Cabo San Lucas, on the fishing grounds of the 95 and 1150 areas, there is warmer 75/76 degree waters found.

Conditions are changing now, cooler waters moving in, unpredictable baitfish migrations, currents and winds also running strong. This is the normal pattern during winter time, lasts through March and then slowly begins the spring time warming trend, another transition period. Every year there are unpredictable trends which constantly change what exactly happens. So far this year seems to be following on a normal track.

While yellowfin tuna have become harder to find for the past few weeks, some tuna are being found further offshore with porpoise, though choppy seas made this hit or miss, still an odd yellowfin being landed off the Gordo Banks, but we have seen this bite fade out now for the past month. In the mean time there have been good numbers of striped marlin, a few late season sailfish, dorado and wahoo keeping anglers occupied. Inshore there are now more sierra appearing, these fast fish are readily striking sardinas, hoochies and rapalas. Some juvenile sized roosterfish scattered along the beach stretches, along with some jack crevalle.

There had been great marlin action off of San Jose del Cabo, this was prior to the most recent full moon, when there had been concentrations of schooling mackerel and sardinetas holding a few miles from shore. This action has faded for the time being and now the better billfish action has been found off of the Pacific grounds and around the 95 and 1150 spots, when weather conditions allowed. Stripers were striking best on cast or dropped back baits, with most marlin weighing in the 80 to 120 pound class, surprisingly a few sailfish also hanging around in the cooling waters.

Dorado are still being found in respectable numbers, most of these fish weighed 5 to 15 lb., a few larger bulls mixed in, these gamefish were found throughout the region, from close to shoe to the offshore marlin grounds. From Punta Gorda, Cardon and La Fortuna, this was perhaps the most productive area in recent days, protected from the northern winds, dorado were found while trolling both lures and bait. Wahoo made a strong showing on these same grounds, most of these fish were relatively small sized, 8 to 15 lb., but there were a handful of respectable 30 to 40 lb. wahoo mixed in with the same juvenile schools. The ‘hoo hit on a wide variety of lures and baitfish, including cast and retrieving jigs, slow trolling with small sardina baits, as well as on rapalas and ballyhoo. With the rapid cooling trend of northern currents, this could be the final bite for these pelagic, which do prefer currents closer to 80 degrees, not 70.

We do expect that there will be more bottom action taking place, as well as increased inshore surface action for the coming months. Striped marlin is always the main offshore target species, now through April. Global weather is increasingly more unpredictable, who knows, maybe another el Nino current could develop at any time. Be it offshore, inshore of off the bottom, there is always a variety of action to be found during the winter months for anglers wishing to get out of the snow and feel some warm sunshine.

The combined panga fleets out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina, sent out approximately 98 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
5 sailfish, 11 striped marlin, 116 wahoo, 6 yellowtail, 374 dorado, 13 yellowfin tuna, 115 sierra, 32 roosterfish, 18 bonito, 18 jack crevalle

Good Fishing, Eric

December 30, 2012
Anglers –

Crowds of holiday season vacationers were traveling to Los Cabos, the majority of tourists were family groups, people were not greeted with a white Christmas, instead they felt warm sunshine, with high temperatures close to 80 degrees, the only thing white about Christmas in Southern Baja, were the miles of pristine white sandy beaches for all to enjoy and with the annual whale migration now in full swing, viewing these giant mammals is just one of many outdoor activities to take advantage of while across the United States residents are enduring blizzard like conditions.

Ocean water temperatures are now in the 73 to 76 degree range, around average for this time period. There have been winds from the north, on and off, blowing 15 mph on some days, this created choppy seas and limited options for anglers traveling north, in the direction of Iman Bank. This is time when ocean currents change rapidly and along with the cooling trend, we also see ocean clarity become off colored, more greenish brown close to shore and blue water typically starts to swift further offshore. So it is another transition period, gamefish migrating different directions according to their preferred food source.

Schooling mackerel and sardinetas have been holding off of the San Jose del Cabo grounds, this has attracted greater numbers of striped marlin and dorado. These fish are being found mainly in an area from 3 to 6 miles offshore. Trolling lures, slow trolling baits and drift fishing while soaking baits deeper for the billfish all produced. Offshore winds made this area a bit rough earlier in the week, conditions settled later in the week.
Average sized striped marlin was in the 80 to 120 pound range. Dorado were weighing from 10 to 30 pounds, many anglers were easily catching their limits and releasing others. Of all species now, dorado have proved to be the most consistent catch, though striped marlin are also being found in good numbers now.

Along the shoreline sierra and smaller sized roosterfish are making up most of the action, best bet is to troll sardinas, these baitfish became scarcer this past week, as surf conditions, tidal swings and feeding schools of jacks made it more different for commercial netters to find supplies. Many charters were using larger sized baitfish, which were fine for offshore, but the best for inshore.

Yellowfin tuna were found offshore traveling with porpoise, but this hit or miss action was mainly an option for fleets out of Cabo San Lucas, out of San Jose del Cabo, the few tuna that were accounted for this past week were taken off of the Gordo Banks and weighed up to 130 pounds. Skipjack remain plentiful on these grounds, though water temperatures are dropping and the season for the cows is ending. Last season there were nice sized yellowfin tuna caught during the winter, during the first part of February, we will have to see what plays out this season.
Not much bottom action now, a few yellowtail up to 30 pound off of the bottom on the Gordo Banks. There were reports of commercial shrimp trawlers, which have been working in local waters recently, netting and then off loading and selling quantities of juvenile sized yellowtail, not good news for the future of the local fishery.

The overall highlight for the 2012 fishing season would have to be the incredible action that developed on the Gordo Banks and endured from September into December for the cow sized yellowfin tuna. The biggest fish we heard about from these grounds this season, weighed 372 lb. yellowfin, this catch occurred during the WON Tuna Jackpot and was the winning fish by a big margin, netting 232 K for local La Playita team “Estrella del Norte”.

The combined panga fleets out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina, sent out approximately 96 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
2 sailfish, 46 striped marlin, 9 wahoo,4 yellowtail, 485 dorado, 5 yellowfin tuna, 90 sierra, 36 roosterfish, 14 bonito, 6 amberjack, 12 cabrilla and 20 pargo.

Good Fishing, Eric

December 22, 2012
Anglers –

While much of the United States is now feeling the freezing chill of harsh winter weather, just 1,000 miles south of the border, in the Los Cabos area, holiday vacationers were being greeted with sunny skies and high temperatures of 80 degrees. The previous week had seen cooler days and persistent north winds, this contributed to dropping ocean water temperatures into the 75/76 degree range, strong currents swept in off colored water and the Fall to Winter ocean transition period was developing.

Baitfish options included mackerel, sardineta, sardina, moonfish, bolito and skipjack. Some anglers were also using pieces of giant squid, which were imported from La Paz or purchased at local super markets. Schools of mackerel are now shifting onto the grounds off of San Jose del Cabo, this always attracts pursuing gamefish, such as striped marlin, dorado and wahoo. While anglers battled with rough seas on the offshore areas like Gordo Banks, on the inside off of Punta Gorda, Cardon and La Fortuna they found comfortable conditions and despite the off colored and not so favorable water, the fish seemed to bite just fine.

Most common species were dorado, hooked on trolled lures and various baitfish, sizes ranged from 5 to 40 pounds and many anglers were easily landing their two fish limits, while releasing additional fish. Wahoo also went on the bite in recent days, hot spot was off of Punta Gorda and live bait, especially mackerel, were taking aggressive strikes, sizes were averaging in the 15 to 30 pound class, many charters were accounting for 3,4,5 or more wahoo, this is the best it has been for a while. Depending on water conditions and the persistence of northern winds, will dictate on how long we might expect for this type of action to continue.

Yellowfin tuna action dropped way down, though at times, anglers who happened to be at the right place, did get into some quality action, areas closer to shore produced sporadic counts for yellowfin tuna in the 10 to 20 pound class, while on the Gordo Banks there were several larger sized tuna accounted for this past week, the largest that we heard of was a 226 lb. cow, taken once again by skipper Chame Pino on the super panga “Killer II”. This fish hit on fresh squid that had been brought down from La Paz, where the giant squid have been plentiful. There was problem drift fishing, very swift current due to windy choppy seas. Forecasts call for a few warmer days, this could be enough to produce a few more big tuna in the coming days.

Only a scattering of bottomfish action, a few pargo and cabrilla being the main catch, also some of the good eating bonito now showing, these are a completely different species than are the bonito found off of So. Cal., these toothy fighters prefer cooler waters, as do sierra, which are now being found in good numbers close to shore, where their favored food source of sardinas are schooling.

The combined panga fleets out of La Playita, Puerto Los Cabos Marina, sent out approximately 95 charters for the week, with anglers accounting for a fish count of:
9 striped marlin, 2 yellowtail, 505 dorado, 52 yellowfin tuna, 62 wahoo, 68 sierra, 16 roosterfish, 24 bonito, 28 misc. pargo species and 50 skipjack .

Good Fishing, Eric